Dharamsala, November 8
The Himachal Pradesh School Education Board has decided not to allow private schools to admit students while their case for affiliation or renewal is pending with the board.

Sources said the board would soon get brochures printed in this regard to intimate private schools not to admit students before the objections raised by the board on their affiliation application were removed by March 31.

Till now, private schools used to admit students even though their cases for fresh affiliation or renewal used to be pending with the board. The board used to give them a go-ahead to safeguard interests of students already admitted.

Private schools now have been asked to complete all formalities before the new session in April and display affiliation certificate on the notice board.

Within 15 days of the start of the new session, information regarding the number of students admitted, staff strength will have to be furnished to the board.

“Till now, the process of granting affiliation used to go on till November, when the schools finally gave their response to the objections raised by the board regarding lack of facilities. But by then the students were admitted and it became difficult to take action against the schools, as one year of students would be at stake. The whole procedure would be sidelined now,” said an official.

“No applications would be accepted after December 31 and the board will conduct inspections of the school infrastructure by January 31. The shortcomings would be communicated to the schools in a month’s time, which should be removed by February 28,” he added. Sources added the school board is also steps to regulate amount of fee and funds charged by the private schools to ensure there is no fleecing.

Also, the school authorities have been asked to make all communications on the official letterheads, mentioning the streams offered at the school, duly signed by the head of the institution.

Shimla, November 8
Concerned over the death of fish due to contamination in the Sirsa river in the Baddi area, the state Environment Protection and Pollution Control Board has laid down guidelines to control pollution.

The death rate of fish has increased even after the installation of effluent treatment plants by industrial units. However, the board has found that pesticide units are the culprits. Highly poisonous chemicals used as raw material were washed into the river, killing a large number of fish.

The board guidelines will not only prevent such contamination of water sources, but also help reduce waste generation during the storage and handling of chemicals. Pesticides units will be required to store chemicals in covered containers and transferred to the blending section through conduits with metered pumps.

Rainwater storage has to be isolated from any other liquid discharge from the unit and all washings would be carried out in covered drainage connected to the effluent treatment plants. Bag filters will have to be installed to arrest fugitive emissions and automatic packaging machines will have to be installed to minimise manual handling.

All hazardous waste, including ETP sludge, waste gloves and clothes will have to be stored in lined containment and proper inventory will have to be maintained.

All treated waste will have to be passed through a fish pond within the premises before releasing it into a nullah or river. It has been made mandatory for all units to maintain a fish pond for the purpose.

Indo-Tibet Border, November 8
Minister of State for Defence M.M. Pallam Raju yesterday visited border areas in Kinnaur district and reviewed construction work on the Hindustan-Tibet road and the Ship ki La road (Indo-China trade route), popularly known as the silk route.

He with Ms Pratibha Singh, local MP, Mrs Rekha Bhargava, Additional Defence Secretary, Brigadier K.P. Singh, Chief Engineer of Project Deepak of the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) and other senior officials of the ministry, local Army units and the BRO visited a few points on the Hindustan-Tibet road and zero km point of the Ship ki La road.

Commander of the 38 Border Roads Task Force (BRTF) Naresh Mittal and M.L. Kom Officer Commanding of the 68 RCC briefed the minister and senior officials of the ministry about the road network in border areas and the progress with regard to the construction work after devastation caused by the last year’s flashflood in the Sutlej.

Mr Raju was keen on knowing possible threats of Parechu river. An Army official briefed in detail with maps and satellite photographs about possible threats from this river. The minister discussed possibilities of a dam across this river somewhere downstream in the Ladakh region from where it originates.

Earlier, the minister also held a meeting with Mr Virbhadra Singh, Chief Minister and Mrs Vidya Stokes, Minister of Power Department of Himachal, yesterday and discussed development of roads in border areas of Kinnaur and Lahaul and Spiti.

Shimla, November 8
Mr I.D. Bali, a senior advocate, today resigned as member of the State Human Rights Commission in protest against the failure of the government to make the institution functional. The resignation was handed over by him to the Governor, Mr V.S. Kokje, at Raj Bhavan here today.

Mr Bali said the commission had virtually become defunct with no chairman, no staff and other infrastructure and no regular office. Meetings of the commission to take up complaints could not be held in the absence of chairperson and the government also did not appoint any acting chairperson after the exit of Justice N.K. Jain. As a result hundreds of complaints had piled up.

He said he had been a member of the commission for more than three years but during this period it properly functioned hardly for about four months. There was no point in continuing as a member of a defunct institution.

The previous BJP government had, in fact, scrapped the commission and it was reconstituted by the present government on the directions of the state High Court on a public interest litigation.

Solan, November 8
Acting on the directions of the state high court the police today started a drive to curb menace of hoardings and posters in the town.

Manager of a restaurant near St Luke’s school was arrested on the charge of having erected a plastic sheet, advertising the restaurant on the national highway at Saproon. Cases against three others were registered under Section 3 of the HP Open Places (Prevention of Disfigurement) Act, 1995.

Cases were registered against the Tata Indicom management, ING Vyasa Insurance Company and student wing of the BJP, ABVP for pasting posters in the town.

The Tata Indicom was found guilty of having erected advertisements outside Court premises on the Mall Road. The insurance company allegedly defaced public premises near Thodo ground by pasting posters.

A number of posters have been pasted by Congress activists informing people to attend October 30 Dharamsala rally of AICC president Ms Sonia Gandhi.

No case has been registered against any Congress activist while the BJP’s student wing the ABVP has been booked. Police officials said these posters had marred beauty of public places and hence registration of cases.

Two cases were registered at Nalagarh against Anand Vocational Training Centre and Asiad Circus. 

Chamba, November 8
According to the 2001 census figures, Chamba is the only district in Himachal Pradesh which has the highest 61.72 per cent households below the poverty line. Out of 76,418 number of families in the district, 47,165 are living below the poverty line. This figure is almost double than the other districts in the state which has put Chamba district on the lowest ebb, thereby poverty is reigning here.

Lahaul and Spiti district having 37.93 per cent households below the poverty line is at the second position, while Shimla having 33.67 per cent households below the poverty line is positioned at the third place.

Similarly, the literacy rate in Chamba district is 63.73 per cent which is also the lowest in the state. Hamirpur tops with 83.2 per cent.

Taking into account these factors, the Government of India had surveyed the most backward districts in the country and Chamba and Sirmaur districts had been selected among the 200 districts in the country for the implementation of the special developmental and poverty alleviation programme, National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.

Kulu, November 8
All the government offices in this district would be equipped with fire-fighting equipment and the employees and local people would be selected for training to operate the equipment.

This was stated by Mr Chamel Singh, Deputy Commissioner, at a workshop organised by the Himachal Home Guards and the Himachal Fire Services here yesterday.

The Deputy Commissioner called upon the people of the district to be vigilant and get trained for any kind of fire accidents. He said the buildings in this district, particularly in the villages, had wooden structures and were prone to fire accidents.

Mr Netar Kant Sharma, Commandant, Home Guards, here, gave detailed descriptions of fire fighting with demonstrations. He said the people’s participation in fire fighting had become essential in this district as the hilly terrain and smaller link roads usually became hindrance to the fire-fighting personnel and by the time they reached the spot it was too late.

He said an awareness campaign had also been initiated to inform villagers about stacking of grass and firewood.

He said the use of damaged and old electricity service wires and consumption beyond the energy meter capacity by the consumers had to be curtailed to avoid fire accidents.

Mr Ses Ram, Chairman, Zila Parishad, Mr Gopal Krishan Mahant, President, Municipal Council, hoteliers and officials attended the workshop.